


don't know how to love

by confettitty



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1990s, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, M/M, SO MUCH CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT IM SORRY, Underage Drinking, a lot of slow burn, all they have are bikes, also full of random shenanigans, and then BOOM trainwreck of angst i promise it'll come, being bad at feelings is a reoccuring theme, i shall update tags as chapters are posted, iwaizumi centred, iwaizumi is so terribly shit with feelings, iwaoi is literally just angst istg, kinda inaccurate because i didnt do enough studying, not following canon timeline, oikawa is literal sunshine istfg, possibly coming of age story ???, small town boys hehe, there is a lot of pain, therefore I AM SORRY HDFHDJ, they dont even have cellphones, they live in the countryside, this is a long one boys, you won't even see it coming
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-02
Updated: 2020-08-02
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:53:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25666990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/confettitty/pseuds/confettitty
Summary: There it sits, wrapped with a pretty golden ribbon in a tiny cardboard box, untouched until Iwaizumi Hajime allows himself the chance.But the chance never comes because Oikawa Tooru catches the last train home and Iwaizumi doesn’t know when the next one will come.
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru
Kudos: 8





	don't know how to love

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a story about a boy who falls in love but doesn't know how to love.

There are so many things Iwaizumi can choose to focus on; so many different ways he can spend his time, but he chooses to give the majority of his attention to Oikawa; he has been for the entirety of his life. Surely, he would have imagined that there’s nothing spectacular about a boy he’s been around for all the fifteen years he’s lived, but he’s quick to realize that isn’t where the narrative has guided him. Oikawa, in the eyes of a normal lad, is just a boy in a small town with hopeful dreams and a bright personality. He should be nobody amazing.

Yet Iwaizumi doesn’t look away from him. He doesn’t _dare_ look away, because, to him, Oikawa is a breath of fresh air you get only in the morning; he’s a fleeting moment in a life so vast and unknown to Iwaizumi, he can be gone the next day.

Oikawa Tooru is someone Iwaizumi Hajime is lucky enough to meet, but too good to be in his life for the rest of it.

There isn’t a way to explain it, not even as Oikawa jogs up to him, yanks on the strap of his bag over his shoulder, and smiles with his lips stretched from ear-to-ear. Iwaizumi doesn’t know how to put it into words so he doesn’t, and he frowns and turns away to continue walking.

“Iwa- _chan,”_ Oikawa whines with emphasis on the endearment, “don’t ignore me!”

“Shut up, you’re annoying,” Iwaizumi grunts out and hoists his bag further up his shoulder.

The days have begun to get a little warmer, with the sun now high enough in the sky to get Iwaizumi’s neck sweaty by the time the final school bell rings. The term has only begun.

“You say I’m annoying but we’ve been friends for all our lives! That’s almost fifteen years, Iwa-chan! If you really hated me, you would have left me by now,” Oikawa rebuts in hopes to invalidate Iwaizumi’s claim, picking up the pace to match the shorter boy’s quick shuffles. He catches up quickly with his considerably long legs.

“I’m leaving you right now.”

Oikawa steps past him then stops to block his path with his arms stretched out to the side. It still doesn’t beat the smile on his face.

“Let’s go get ice cream.”

They end up at the ice cream shop after they dropped off their bags. Iwaizumi bikes to Oikawa’s home with him, waits outside while the brunette heads inside to tell his parents they are going out for a little treat, and then they bike to Iwaizumi’s for himself to do the same. The familiar old man sits behind the counter when they step inside with the bell chiming above their heads, face lifting at the sight of the two. The place smells of the same old sugary sweetness from strawberry ice cream and handmade waffle cones. Oikawa always gets the vanilla in a fresh cone and Iwaizumi gets his chocolate in a small paper cup. It has never changed despite the store adding more and more different flavours over the years.

“You boys grow so fast,” the old man says from where he sits, eyes with wrinkles at their corners observing them as they eat their dessert. “You in high school now?”

Oikawa does most of the talking. Iwaizumi lets the chocolate coldness melt on his tongue, attention partially on the conversation but mostly on the way the vanilla drips down onto Oikawa’s index finger.

“The term just started but high school is super cool!” Oikawa explains fervently. “There are a lot of clubs and stuff—did you know that we have a club for _tennis?_ Sports clubs weren’t even a thing in junior high.”

“It’s what happens when you live in a small town,” the old man replies with a chuckle, then a silenced cough. “When I was your age, we didn’t even have clubs.”

“I wonder what it’s like out there in the big cities,” Oikawa sighs dreamily, and Iwaizumi watches the whiteness trickle down to Oikawa’s first knuckle. His chocolate ice cream suddenly tastes like vanilla. “Iwa-chan!”

 _“Don’t_ call me that,” Iwaizumi mumbles around his spoon, gaze finally lifting to meet the other’s eyes.

“Have you ever thought about visiting a big city? Like Tokyo?”

Iwaizumi digs his spoon into his cup. “The hell’s so great about Tokyo?”

Oikawa frowns and angles his body towards him. “Tokyo has so many things. Our town is so small. Iwa-chan, don’t you want to see new and exciting things?”

“No,” he responds gruffly, “I have everything I need here.”

Oikawa huffs. “Fine, you do you. Don’t be mad when I come back a superstar and you’re stuck here farming or something.”

To that, Iwaizumi says nothing, but when he falls asleep that night, he doesn’t stop thinking about what might happen if Oikawa decides to one day leave him for that big, metropolitan city he’s always talking about.

The fear is so loud it keeps him up an extra hour, but still, Iwaizumi says nothing.

Classes tend to be the same every day, but it’s Oikawa that makes it all a little more exciting. Sometimes, he’ll ask Iwaizumi if he wants to go that tiny food-stand by the corner of the block five minutes off-campus during their lunch break. Other times, he’ll surprise him with an onigiri his mom makes twice a week, one for Oikawa and two for Iwaizumi because she knows how much he likes her food.

Needless to say, every day is not the same despite arriving at school at the same time on weekday mornings, dropping his bike on the same bike rack every time, and sitting in the same classroom until the dismissal bell rings. Oikawa will pop by his desk during the breaks, no matter how small, and surprise him with something Iwaizumi never sees coming no matter how hard he tries.

Oikawa runs on spontaneity and Iwaizumi lives off of it. 

Today, Oikawa drags him to the field. They plop down under the shade of the biggest tree they can find and Oikawa pulls two small bento boxes out of his bag, a light, daisy yellow and a cherry blossom pink. Iwaizumi lets the other boy drop the pink one in his lap, his own hands immediately curling around the locks on the sides as he has done so too many times to count.

“You know, you can tell your mom I bring my own lunch.”

Oikawa frowns. “Did you bring lunch today?”

Iwaizumi opts for silence because he didn’t and doesn’t want to tell the other. He mumbles a quiet _itadakimasu_ before picking up the matching pair of chopsticks. Oikawa rambles about how he had helped his mom prepare today’s tonkatsu meal and that he had been the one to carefully make the smiley with the black sesame seeds on Iwaizumi’s rice.

Iwaizumi gives a hum, but he finds himself listening to every word coming out of the brunette’s mouth. He doesn’t dwell too much on _why_ but realizes that he hangs onto Oikawa’s words like he’s afraid he’ll miss something he says.

“Iwa-chan, are you even listening?”

“Yes,” Iwaizumi replies promptly, a piece of chicken katsu in his mouth.

Oikawa sets down his bento. “I don’t believe you. What was I saying?”

He was talking about how he needed a haircut, was planning on getting one tomorrow, and wanted to know if Iwaizumi would come with him (he doesn’t know how he went from bento boxes to haircuts, but Iwaizumi doesn’t bother asking anymore because Oikawa’s brain works in wondrous ways he’ll never understand), but he settles for, “You were being annoying.”

“But will you come?”

“Sure.”

Iwaizumi presses his back into the leather cushion of one of the seats. It’s been worn out over the years and he wonders if the barber is planning on getting new ones soon with the way the fabric has detached itself from its seams. The rough material scratches on the backs of his knees as he watches the scissors snip away at the fronts of Oikawa’s bangs.

“You kids doing okay in school?” the barber asks, comb sandwiched between her teeth.

“Iwaizumi is so smart,” Oikawa says. “I need to catch up to him or I’ll never get into university.”

Iwaizumi snorts from his spot at Oikawa’s response. He leans back into the headrest and allows his eyes to fall shut, the heat from the Saturday early afternoon starting to make him drowsy.

“Yeah?” she asks. “You guys are planning to go to university?”

“I am!”

Iwaizumi’s eyes flutter open, and the cracked ceiling above his head greets him plainly.

“Where to?”

“I don’t know. Somewhere cool, I think. Iwa-chan, where do you want to go?”

Iwaizumi shifts in his seat and closes his eyes again. “Don’t wanna.”

“Hmph, Iwa-chan is so boring.”

The barber cuts in, “It’s normal, though. Not many people head off to university here. If you do, you’re going to be the talk of the town, but you’d like that, wouldn’t you, Tooru?” It’s less of a question and more of a statement because everyone knows Oikawa Tooru and his best friend Iwaizumi Hajime. A bright young kid with even brighter plans and a boy who lives his life day-to-day. It’s not that Iwaizumi doesn’t think about what he wants to do in the future, but it’s that he doesn’t _know_ what he wants. He opens his eyes again, this time finding Oikawa staring down at him from next to his seat. For a second, he drowns himself in those pretty, dark brown irises and admires the way Oikawa bathes in the golden glow of the afternoon sun spilling into the windows.

“Ta- _dah!_ All done! How do I look?”

“Ugly.”

Oikawa gasps, offended. “Did you hear that? Iwa-chan just called me ugly!”

“You guys are such children.”

And perhaps they are. Fifteen is a young age to blossom at. Senior high school has only just started but Iwaizumi feels like time is going by faster than it should be, and he knows that isn’t a good sign.

Iwaizumi doesn’t find the need to bring it up.

Oikawa finds a job partway through the first term. Iwaizumi wonders how he’s going to balance school work and a part-time job but Oikawa dismisses his concern with, “Don’t worry, Iwa-chan! I’ll be okay. I just need some money, that’s all!”

Well, they could all use some money, but he doesn’t think it’s really necessary for his best friend to have a job. What is he even going to spend it on?

It doesn’t take long for Iwaizumi to find out, however, as Oikawa shows up the next day with two full bags of sour gummy rings, half of it orange and the other half red. They sit on the bench by the schoolyard after the bell has rung and the students have already scurried home after a tiring Thursday. Oikawa reaches for his hand and Iwaizumi watches him roll the gummy ring down his index finger. He struggles at his knuckle and complains about how thick Iwaizumi’s hands are and that he should stop doing so much work on the farm.

Iwaizumi slips his hand out of Oikawa’s grasp and holds it up to his face, the candied sugar glistening in the sunlight. “The hell do I do with this?”

“You eat it!”

"Off of my _finger?”_

Oikawa takes his hand back into his own. “Yeah, like this!” He leans forward and nibbles down on the side of the gummy until it breaks, and Iwaizumi watches, eyes following the way a pink tongue darts out to clean up the excess sourness left behind.

“Here, you try.” Oikawa pulls open the plastic bag and presses it forward. Reluctantly, Iwaizumi reaches a hand inside to pull out another sour gummy ring. He slips it down the same index finger, although not as far as Oikawa had done earlier, and pulls it right off with his teeth.

“See? It’s more fun when you eat it like that, right?”

Iwaizumi grumbles, “I guess.”

They sit under the heat of the sun. Summer is beginning to kick in and Iwaizumi has gotten a little tanner with the hours he spends on the fields helping his father on the farm. He can’t help but notice the stark contrast of their thighs brushing against each other, a mochi paleness to his dark olive. Oikawa must take care of his skin well, and Iwaizumi can’t care less about what he puts on his own.

Iwaizumi bikes home that evening with a store-bought bottle of sunscreen in his bag.

“Hey.”

Iwaizumi ignores the foot prodding at his side.

“Hey, Iwa-chan,” Oikawa continues persistently. “Iwa-chan, hey.”

“Fuck,” Iwaizumi curses, flipping his textbook over, “what do you want?”

Oikawa plops down on the carpet next to where the black-haired male lays. Iwaizumi arches upward, groaning at the pops in his spine as he turns over from his stomach to his side.

“Let’s do something.”

Iwaizumi makes a face. _“Haah?_ We haven’t even started studying for ten minutes and you already want to do something?” This boy is seriously something. He doesn’t even know how Oikawa is going to get into university with the way he habitually spends all his time doing something “fun” instead of studying to boost his average grades.

“You don’t even need to study! You’re already smart.”

Iwaizumi sits up to face him properly. “I’m talking about _you,_ idiot.” He jabs a finger into Oikawa’s knee, tsk-ing at the feigned pain the other depicts. “How the hell are _you_ going to get better if you don’t study?”

Oikawa gives a silent gasp. “I _do_ study! You never see when I study, so obviously you don’t think I study.”

“Study right now.”

“But Iwa-chan—”

“No.”

It isn’t until another hour into studying does Iwaizumi get another nudge, only this time it’s an accident. He turns his head, about to lecture Oikawa into, hopefully, another hour of studying, when he realizes the boy has fallen asleep. His heel had tilted to the side and knocked into Iwaizumi’s, which was what pulled him out of his focus.

Oikawa’s lashes are so long Iwaizumi can see each and every individual strand against the highs of his cheeks. His breaths are even, and there’s a little bit of drool at the corner of his mouth, but Iwaizumi pays it little attention when he’s in awe of the way Oikawa looks when he’s asleep. It isn’t like he has never seen him sleep before (what, with all the sleepovers they’ve had and continue to have), but it’s been a little different recently.

It feels a little different.

With a grunt, Iwaizumi sits up and closes his textbook softly. He really doesn’t want to wake Oikawa up, but the floor isn’t really the best place to sleep.

“Hey,” he says, nudging Oikawa’s shoulder with a gentleness he doesn’t know he has. “Wake up.”

Oikawa stirs with a mumble, “Is it time?”

“Time?” Iwaizumi repeats quizzically.

“To do something.”

The laugh slips before Iwaizumi can catch on to it. It’s short like a surprised chuckle, and Oikawa either doesn’t find it out of the norm (which it is), or he’s just too sleepy to recognize it after having woken up from his brief slumber. “Whaddya wanna do?”

“Waffles?”

Iwaizumi gawks. “Really? It’s six.”

Oikawa drops his cheek back into his textbook with a whine. “I want _waffles.”_

“Fine. You pay.”

 _“What?”_ Oikawa lifts his head so fast his hair flips, and Iwaizumi can’t hold in his bout of laughter. “Why _me?”_

“You have a job, don’t you?”

“Oh! You’re right! I haven’t treated Iwa-chan to anything since I got a job. Let’s go get waffles! _My treat!”_ Oikawa exclaims so excitedly Iwaizumi imagines he has just woken up from a fresh eight-hour sleep. “Man, I’ve always wanted to say that.”

Iwaizumi imagines this is what life with Oikawa will be like for the rest of his life. They’ll wake up, go to school, do something after school work even though he never knows what it’ll be, and fall asleep under the same moon and stars that watch over their bodies, still in their slumber next to the familiar shadows of their rooms.

Waffles have never been his favourite, but Oikawa loves them. Iwaizumi thinks he spends a little too much on those dry carbs considering how he doesn’t actually enjoy them as much as the other does, and Oikawa knows this.

“They’ll grow on you,” he tells him with his mouth stuffed like he has done so every time they visit the diner; has been telling him since they were six years old and had enough pocket change to split a plate of waffles together. Of course, Oikawa would eat most of it despite Iwaizumi paying for almost all of it.

“You have more money, so you pay,” is what Oikawa would tell him, and it was true. Iwaizumi, as a kid, would work random jobs for his neighbours in return for a few coins. Oikawa’s parents were more generous, and that was not saying Iwaizumi’s weren’t, but he never liked asking for money. Even now, he refuses to accept any money from his parents despite him working all day on weekends and some evenings after school.

Oikawa sometimes visits and stays for dinner. He’ll watch Iwaizumi from the first two steps on his wooden porch, comment on how much he sweats under the blazing heat of the sun, and then run inside the house to bring out a fresh glass of water, which Iwaizumi downs immediately. If it isn’t for Oikawa, he’ll never know how dehydrated he can get while he works. If it isn’t for Oikawa, Iwaizumi doesn’t think he’ll know how to properly take care of himself.

He’s thankful for Oikawa, but it’s something he’ll never say aloud. He doesn’t find the necessity in it and doesn’t think he’ll ever have the chance, anyway.

So, he doesn’t.

On Iwaizumi’s sixteenth birthday, Oikawa doesn’t show up to school. As a matter of fact, Iwaizumi feels like he’s been seeing less of his face in the past week. He’s gone by the time Iwaizumi snaps out of his half-dazed studying after the final bell goes, and when he stops by Oikawa’s place in the mornings like he usually does so they can bike to school together, his mother tells him he has already gone out. Something is up, and Iwaizumi can’t seem to catch him before he’s out of reach.

It’s like he keeps slipping out from between Iwaizumi’s fingertips every time he gets close enough to land an unsteady grip on him.

He doesn’t expect to see him today, but here he is.  
“Oikawa,” he speaks through gritted teeth when he comes face to face with the boy standing sheepishly at his doorstep.

“Surprise, Iwa-chan! Did you think I’d ever forget your birthday?” Oikawa exclaims with his hands behind his back, and Iwaizumi narrows his eyes with suspicion.

“What did you do?” His words come out more as a statement because he _knows_ Oikawa did something, but he can’t figure out what. From his years of knowing the brunette better than he knows himself, he can never seem to recognize what goes on inside his head. It’s the only thing Iwaizumi doesn’t know. He can tell when Oikawa is upset and he can tell when he’s hungry. He knows when Oikawa craves for something sweet, or if he has itchy feet and needs to go somewhere. But he’ll never know what he’s actually thinking.

From Iwaizumi’s silent observation, Oikawa usually speaks his mind about most things. Does this taste good? Is it too sugary? Too much salt? Is this colour flattering? It’s always the simple, trivial things he talks about. Iwaizumi doesn’t think he’s ever seen Oikawa talk about topics related to how he feels. There’s a side of Oikawa that Iwaizumi imagines is so _unlike_ Oikawa that he hides, and he doesn’t know if he’ll ever see it. He knows it definitely exists, though. Oikawa is human, too, after all.

“It’s your birthday, so I’m inviting you out!”

Iwaizumi fights the urge to roll his eyes. Oikawa has been talking to him less and less, doesn’t show up to school today, and now, he’s here asking to take Iwaizumi out on a birthday treat?

Like hell he will—at least, not without an explanation first.

“Where the hell have you been?” he demands, arms crossed over his chest.

Oikawa shrugs, hands still behind his back. “Working.”

“During school? What the hell are you thinking?”

“It was only this week! It’s worth it, though.”

Iwaizumi doesn’t buy it. “And why’s that?” His eyes narrow down to his hidden wrists. “What’s behind your back? Show me.”

For a reason so surprisingly simple, Iwaizumi does not see it coming. Oikawa brings his hands forward, fingers curled around a medium-sized paper bag. It’s white with no marking on it, so Iwaizumi has to guess what’s inside.

“For your birthday gift,” Oikawa responds, pressing the bag forward and into Iwaizumi.  
He blinks down at it, hands instinctively closing around the bag in case it drops. He stares at it, then raises his eyes to meet Oikawa’s sternly. “You skipped school for _this?”_

“It was expensive! I had to work some extra hours so I can afford it.”

Iwaizumi sighs. The last thing he wants is Oikawa missing classes and sacrificing his grades for a birthday present. They never really spent money on each other’s birthdays, so what makes his sixteenth so special?

“Return it.” He thrusts the bag back towards the other with a sigh. “You can use that money for something else.”

Oikawa looks offended. “What? No! I bought this for you.”

Iwaizumi frowns because he knows he can’t really win with the way Oikawa looks at him. He’s never really won is what he realizes as he drops his hand with the bag still in it. “You’re an idiot.”

The expression on Oikawa’s face lifts almost instantly. “Only for you, Iwa-chan!”

The black-haired male huffs then drops his chin to look at the bag. “What is it?” He pulls apart the two handles to find a shoebox. He freezes, eyes zoning in on the familiarity of the logo before closing his fists together, disbelief colouring his cheeks.

“Are you fucking stupid? Return these.”

“Why? I thought you liked them.”

Iwaizumi lets out a noise of frustration. “You bought these! You are well aware of how _expensive_ these are. Couldn’t you have gotten me, like, candy or something?”

“Because Iwa-chan doesn’t like candy…. I saw you eyeing these shoes, but… I didn’t know you wouldn’t like them.”

Iwaizumi sucks in a sharp breath through his teeth. It’s not that he doesn’t like these shoes. Oikawa was right—Iwaizumi _has_ been looking at these shoes, probably for weeks now. He would always turn his head when they passed by the store, but they would never go inside because they both knew they can’t really afford anything in there. Well, _couldn’t,_ at least for Oikawa. Iwaizumi still can’t afford these, and that’s why Oikawa needs to return these.

He can’t have these.

“I know what you’re thinking but—please, take them. I worked really hard for them! I worked really hard because I… want you to be happy, too. You’re always working hard but you never take care of yourself. There’s also a bottle of sunscreen in there, by the way.”

Iwaizumi stares at Oikawa. For the first time in a long time, he finds himself at a loss for words. For the first time ever, Iwaizumi thinks the way Oikawa looks, standing at his front door with the evening sun kissing his cheeks and turning the strands of his brown hair a soft chocolate, is _beautiful._ He looks _ethereal,_ and Iwaizumi doesn’t know what to do with this sudden racing of his heart. It’s almost as though time has stopped, and Iwaizumi doesn’t know _what to do_ with the way Oikawa smiles so brightly at him, it rivals the brightest star in the sky.

In the end, what he offers is a laugh of defeat, coupled with a sigh that follows and a hand running through his short hair. There is no winning when it involves Oikawa Tooru, so Iwaizumi gives up.

“Thank you.”

Oikawa leans forward, arms curling around Iwaizumi’s upper torso with jovial laughter. “Happy birthday, Hajime.”

And _god,_ does Iwaizumi feel like crying. He doesn’t know why—doesn’t want to _think_ about why, but the way his heart beats loudly in his ears and the amount of emotions building higher and higher at the pit of his stomach is overwhelming and it’s too much. It’s too much and Iwaizumi cries.

“Iwa-chan?”

Iwaizumi doesn’t let Oikawa pull away. He curls an arm around the other boy’s waist and hugs him closer, chin resting on a soft, cotton shirt over a skinny shoulder as he squeezes his eyes shut.

“I’m okay.”

He isn’t. In the brief life he’s lived—the fleeting moments he’s had every day with this boy—Iwaizumi discovers that this is not okay. He is not all right and doesn’t know why.

“Iwa-chan… are you crying?”

“No.”

“You are! Why are you crying?”

Iwaizumi, instead of responding, just hugs Oikawa tighter. He feels the wetness on his cheeks, hot with a burning trail, so he doesn’t let the other boy struggle out of his hold. They stay there for a minute, but it feels like seconds to Iwaizumi. It’s a little awkward to stand like that, but at the same time, it isn’t enough, and he doesn’t know how to ask for more.

When he leans back, his eyes are wet and red. When Oikawa leaves after trying to beat the reason out of Iwaizumi, he watches his bike disappear down the gravel road. When Iwaizumi slips his feet into his new shoes, he thinks about the smile on Oikawa’s face. When he sets the bottle of sunscreen next to his nearly-empty bottle he had bought last month, he wonders just how much of an influence the other boy has on him.

When Iwaizumi pulls his covers up to his chin that night, he dreams of the stars.

The summer heat has started to kick in by the time July has come around. If Iwaizumi thought it had been hot before, it definitely doesn’t beat the way the humidity of the seventh month makes his thin cotton tee stick to his torso from simply brushing his teeth. All the windows in his home are open, but the lack of breeze makes it a fruitless strive.

By the time Iwaizumi finishes his Saturday studying, the time has rolled towards late afternoon. The temperature in his house is unbearable. He briefly wonders what having air conditioning is like. He thinks, for the sake of being comfortable in his own house during the summers, he’s willing to move somewhere closer to the city if air conditioning is accessible.

Just kidding. Iwaizumi leans into the sweat of his back with a yawn and an upwards stretch. The heat is beginning to make him feel sluggish, and the lethargy settling in his veins is making his bed call for him. He slips the useless shirt off his body and kicks his shorts off until all he’s left in is his underwear, then falls face-first into his pillow. He’s done enough studying for today. He can do the rest tomorrow.

When he awakens, it’s to a dark room, a thump on the spot next to him, and a mumbled curse.

“Oikawa?”

The shuffling stops abruptly. “Huh? How’d you know it was me?”

“I can sense your dumbassery.”  
His bed at the foot of the frame dips with weight, creaking under stress from overuse. “How mean, Iwa-chan!”

“Why the hell are you here?”

Oikawa flops backward and lands himself on Iwaizumi’s calves. “I got bored and wanted to see what you were up to! Turn out you’re just being lazy and sleeping away.”

With the way Iwaizumi has to wait to allow his vision to adjust to the shadows in his room, he can tell it’s very, very late. These days, the sun doesn’t settle until past eleven. He wants to know why Oikawa is here, thumb rolling languid circles into the bone of Iwaizumi’s ankle, instead of sleeping in his own bed at his own home.

But he doesn’t ask, and not because he doesn’t want to know, but because he doesn’t exactly care. He doesn’t say a word about the way Oikawa drags his fingernails over the skin of his foot or the way he pinches at the sparse leg hairs dotting the fronts of his calves. He doesn’t comment on how Oikawa lifts himself up and lays down next to him or the fact that his skin raises goosebumps despite the temperature in his room still being too hot to enjoy.

“Are you asleep?” Oikawa’s voice is small; quiet but clear in the silence of the empty space.

“Yes.”

“Liar! How can you be asleep if you’re talking to me?”

Iwaizumi turns onto his side, back facing the other boy. “I am sleeping right now.”

Oikawa follows suit and turns, and Iwaizumi suddenly feels the other is a little too close. He doesn’t ask him to move away. He doesn’t ask him to go home.

“Do you ever think about how small we are?”

Iwaizumi doesn’t respond, his breaths evening out in his attempt to fall asleep despite having slept half the day away. He has no clue what Oikawa is about to start talking about, but he listens anyway.

“We’re just little beings of a common species in a vast universe. We live in a tiny town with one convenience store, a small market, and a population of less than one thousand. The nearest gas station is a ten-minute drive away at one hundred twenty kilometres per hour. The nearest hospital is almost two hours. We live on an island in a world with over a hundred countries. We don’t even know what other planets there are out there. We don’t know what the ocean floor looks like.” The pause that follows makes Iwaizumi stir, head turning with a twist of his torso at his midsection to glance at Oikawa, who has stilled with his eyes pointed to the ceiling.

“And?”

“And we’re just two boys in this big universe,” Oikawa whispers. “That’s it.”

Iwaizumi turns to lay flat on his back again. He doesn’t know how big this universe is, and he doesn’t want to. He does, however, know that this is all he needs. This—laying in sweat-soaked sheets next to a boy he’s recently recognized is someone very important to him, is all he needs to be satisfied.

To put it into words he’ll never say aloud, _this_ is his universe, and it’s already as big as it needs to be.

Oikawa’s birthday is usually the last day of school before summer break. They always do something to celebrate (it’s also always Oikawa’s idea what they do), and it’s something different every year. Iwaizumi remembers being eight years old and following Oikawa to the lake. The bike ride had been half an hour long but it had been worth it to see the stars with their backs pressed into the grassiness of the surroundings. The water glistened under the luminance of the moon and the night breeze that is always difficult to come by during the midsummer had cooled the sweat on their bodies to a stickiness neither of them minded. Iwaizumi had loved the sounds of the evening cicadas, but he loved the smile on Oikawa’s face more. It had been unlike his other ones; this one had been the most genuine he’s ever seen.

Iwaizumi wants to witness it again.

“It’s my birthday, Iwa-chan!”

Iwaizumi turns his cheek the other way and shifts just slightly to the left to find a cooler spot on his desk. “I know,” he mumbles. The sunlight makes him see orange behind his eyelids as he tries to shut out the lunch break laughter of the classroom in order to get a quick afternoon nap in.

“I want to do something!” Oikawa exclaims, grabbing a nearby chair so he can sit down next to Iwaizumi. “Do something with me.”

Iwaizumi slowly opens his eyes, then snaps them shut when he realizes the brightness from the blue sky behind the classroom windows is a little too much for him right now. “What do you want?”

“Let’s go camping!”

At the sound of that, Iwaizumi sits upright with a squint and a couple lazy blinks to get the sleepiness out of his eyes. “The hell do you mean ‘let’s go camping’? It’s fucking twenty-eight degrees today. You wanna die in the wilderness or something?”

“Not saying I want to die, but a natural death would be nice.” There’s a pause. “Did you get it? Natural cause of death? Nature?”

Iwaizumi drops his head back to his desk. “No.”

Oikawa splits half of his egg sandwich with Iwaizumi five minutes before the bell signalling the end of the lunch break rings. Oikawa begrudgingly treads back to his assigned seat (he has time and time again expressed how he hates being so far away from Iwaizumi despite them only being three seats apart) before their teacher steps back into the classroom to wrap up the end of the first term.

  
Iwaizumi nearly falls asleep as the teacher’s voice drones on. He does, eventually, which isn’t a common occurrence, so he supposes that’s why nobody bothers him. That, or it’s the last day of school and nobody really cares as much anymore. When he awakens, it’s to Oikawa dropping a pile of summer homework on his desk, but he cares more about the smile gracing the other boy’s face.

“Camping, Iwa-chan!”

Iwaizumi asks to borrow his father’s truck until the next day. They drive an hour out to where the trees grow taller and bigger. They’re about fifteen minutes into the wilderness when he turns off onto a gravel path big enough to fit one car. He’ll have trouble getting back out, but he figures it’ll be a good opportunity to practise driving in reverse, not that he ever thinks he’ll need it.

They set up the tent a good ten-minute walk away from where they hop off the truck (it’s mostly Iwaizumi doing the work and Oikawa staring at the pieces of Iwaizumi’s old tent).

“Iwa-chan, you’re so cool! Who knew you could build a tent so quickly!” Oikawa speaks with a fascination so strong it’s almost as though he had just watched Iwaizumi invent a new piece of technology.

“It’s not that difficult,” Iwaizumi says, getting up from his squatting position with a grunt. It’s a tight squeeze for two grown boys, but they’ll manage. They always do. He turns to look at Oikawa, who’s already climbing under the flaps of the entrance. He sighs watching the struggle, then steps forward to hold up the fabric for him. “Are you impressed?”

“There’s so much room in here!”

Iwaizumi snorts. “Wait until you have to sleep next to me.”

Oikawa pauses for a second before turning his neck with a quizzical expression. “Why? I’ve already slept next to you.”

Iwaizumi freezes, eyes widening just a fraction. He coughs, clears his throat, and drops the flap before walking away with his back turned. He lets out a shaky exhale. What the hell was that? He pats himself on the cheek with the back of his hand, mumbling a _what the fuck_ under his breath.

“Iwa-chan, look!”

Iwaizumi turns, a hand on his hip as he catches the wave Oikawa excitedly gives. He walks over, not sure if he’s going to be as enthralled as the other boy by whatever’s caught his attention.

“There are tadpoles!”

Iwaizumi crouches next to him, eyes trailing over the little creatures swimming in the wet crevice in the ground.

“Did you know that tadpoles store all of their consumed food into their tails so that when they morph into their froglet form, they suck up all the nutrients in their tails?”

“No, I didn’t.”

Oikawa crouches down with him. “That’s how they get rid of their tails!”

For the next five minutes, Oikawa is talking his ear off about tadpoles and frogs. Iwaizumi cracks open a can of beer midway through something about frogs breathing through their skin.

Oikawa gasps. “You’re _drinking?”_

Iwaizumi gives him a pointed look as he changes his seated position on the rock so the sharp edge isn’t digging into his butt. “You look surprised.”

Oikawa frowns then plops himself down on the grass. “Give me one.”

A can is tossed in the brunette’s direction, and it lands in his hands safely. The sky has turned from a bright blue to a warm blend of oranges and pinks. The purple of the sky sits high above their heads, and it makes the contrast of the green trees around them a type of comforting he can’t ever find back home. Iwaizumi slides off the rock and chooses to lean back into it instead.

“Are you cold?” he asks with a mumble behind the lip of his can.

“Don’t be silly, Iwa-chan. You said it yourself that it’s going to be very warm tonight.”

Well, it isn’t a lie. It _is_ very warm still, but the temperature can drop with a little bit of elevation. They’re not too high up considering how the paved path only goes so far. Iwaizumi doesn’t know why he had asked.

They go on an adventure after downing two cans of beer (Oikawa finishes one and a quarter of a can, so Iwaizumi has to finish it for him before they crush them up and tuck them away in his backpack) to look for cool animals. It’s Oikawa’s idea, but Iwaizumi goes along with it anyway, as always. They come by some berries that Iwaizumi sternly tells him _not to eat,_ some pretty flowers that Iwaizumi accidentally steps on, resulting in multiple, angry slaps on his back from the other, and a small pond with a large, sunken wooden log in the middle of it. Oikawa suggests they go for a dip, so Iwaizumi has to remind him they only have what they’re wearing right now.

Nevertheless, Oikawa takes his shoes and socks off and lets his feet create ripples in the turquoise water, kicking up clouds of dirt under his ministrations. “It’s warm!”

“Of course it is, dumbass. It’s a pond and it’s summer,” Iwaizumi retorts, sitting down next to Oikawa. He doesn’t dip his feet in the water, however. He simply watches Oikawa’s smooth skin glide in the clarity of the pond, his own fingers digging into the dry soil behind him.

The sky sinks into a deeper colour by the time Oikawa’s toes have gotten pruney, so Iwaizumi tells them it’s time to head back so they don’t get lost in the dark. When they settle in their blankets and extra sheets Iwaizumi had pulled out of his closet because they don’t have sleeping bags, he tries not to think about how close Oikawa is next to him. Their arms brush against each other with every small movement the other boy makes. Iwaizumi has to hold his breath when Oikawa’s head drops to the side, and he finds himself staring at long eyelashes resting upon pink cheeks from the effects of their drinking.

Oikawa had asked him something earlier in the evening. Iwaizumi tilts his head up to the roof of their tent and lets out a heavy exhale. He’s tired and his legs ache from all the hiking they had done, but he doesn’t know if he can fall asleep right now. He wonders what Oikawa had meant when he asked, “Do animals love the same way humans do?”

How do humans love?

How does _he_ love?

Iwaizumi blinks, a little too focused on how the darkness behind his eyelids matches the darkness inside their tent.

What does it mean to love?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i am BACK !!!  
> i'm so sorry for not posting anything because work has been literally sucking up all of my t i m e .  
> i've been working on many projects but i am most excited to post this one !! so have at it because i'm highkey proud of this one uwu
> 
> till next time lovelies!


End file.
